*GLOBAL COOLING: 2017-2053: Agriculture Must Prepare*
Mar 28, 2018 1:38:36 GMT
hrizzo, glennkoks, and 3 more like this
Post by AstroMet on Mar 28, 2018 1:38:36 GMT
GLOBAL COOLING: 2017 to 2053
Agriculture Must Prepare
by Theodore White, astromet.sci
Ice covers the pier of a harbor at Constance, Lake Constance, Germany on March 1, 2018
The era of global cooling began mid-December 2017, as I have long forecasted and the winter season throughout the northern hemisphere has seen the weather of this new climate regime take hold - stretching from North America to Eurasia.
Throughout most of North America, a polar outbreak saw frigid temperatures from late December 2017 into early January to the Midwest, East and South.
Numerous American cities in the East saw the coldest first week of January on record. The arctic blast experienced in the eastern U.S. resulted in the coldest first week of January on record - and this took place just as my long-stated forecast for the official arrival of global cooling to come by mid-December 2017.
Meanwhile, in Europe, heavy snowfall, followed by arctic temperatures struck popular tourist destinations in Italy, forcing the closure of the dome on Florence's cathedral and Giotto's bell tower.
Snow was to be seen on beaches, even in the south of the country. Snow fell in Rome, Venice, Siena, Pisa, Florence and Naples.
In southern France, at least 1,500 stranded motorists were evacuated from their cars on motorways near Montpellier.
The Norwegian municipality Folldal in the southeastern county of Hedmark recorded Europe's lowest temperature as mercury plunged to minus 41.8 degrees Celsius, public broadcaster NRK reported, citing the Norwegian Meteorological Institute.
I have long forecasted that by December 2017 the world would see the start of the new climate era of global cooling, a mini ice age, which will rival the previous Maunder Minimum.
Despite calls that I was wrong and that humanity is the cause of global warming, with ever rising temperatures, I continued to forecast and predict that global cooling would begin officially in mid-December 2017, just ahead of the Sun's Grand Minimum.
The cause of climate changes is the Sun, which governs the Earth's climate and its weather. Modulated by the planets of our solar system, all climate change comes from astrophysical causes and the effects are geophysical, resulting in various forms of 'weather' here, on Earth.
In reality, there is no such thing as 'man-made global warming,' or 'man-made climate change.' That is impossible according to the laws of physics and thermodynamics.
The Sun is the source of light, heat and the entire well-being of our planet. Taking a closer look at the Sun and how the solar sunspot cycle affects the Earth is rich in history and holds the key to understanding how the Earth's highly variable climate and weather actually functions - in the real world.
We have been taught that the basic sunspot cycle is a period of eleven (11) years from peak to peak. We also learned that during this cycle the Earth is affected in many ways, most importantly, how the Earth's climate reacts to the changes of activity of the Sun.
During the peak of a solar cycle, many sunspots appear on the surface or the photosphere of the Sun, along with numerous solar flares and larger events known as CMEs, that is, coronal mass ejections. These events stream out high energy particles at the Earth and disrupt radio, computer electronics, satellite and space travel operations.
New research is telling us that the next solar minimum - starting with the soon-to-be Solar Cycle #25 - may be the deepest minimum in more than 100 years.
If that is true, data showed that during solar minimum with less sunspots, solar surface flares and CMEs, there is a strong potential for a large scale cooling of the weather on Earth - a mini ice age.
This goes against those who say that a steady increase in worldwide temperatures is caused by human beings.
New research claims that a spotless Sun during previous sunspot minimas have led to sustained periods of cold weather and crop failures around the planet.
The most pronounced was the great Maunder Minimum from 1640 to 1715, in which the Earth experienced major climatic change.
There have been other deep solar minima, but not on the same scale as the Grand Minimum.
In the most simplistic way, the research tells us that the less sunspot numbers on the Sun, the cooler the planet becomes. The higher the sunspot numbers, the warmer the planet gets.
More cooling and there exists a greater percentage of crop failures, as well as, higher fuel prices and food prices. That would not be good for the global economy, as we may approach this small mini ice age.
For over a decade, I have been warning agriculture in general and farmers in particular to prepare for the era of global cooling.
Despite many farmers enjoying record crop yields and very good price levels before 2015; it has been a fact that agriculture simply wanted to sit back and enjoy their earnings but did not want to save, nor see either the commodities price bust of late 2014 coming; nor wanted to face the real threat of global cooling I have long been warning about.
Crop losses have come from the weather of global cooling, which features torrential rains and floods, excessive drought, radical temperature variations and the increase of cosmic rays causing low level clouds and reduced sunlight.
For instance, Peru has seen a lack of rain which threatens mango, banana and lemon crops. And 2018 marks the second consecutive year that Georgia peach and blueberry growers have been affected by frost damages with low temperatures in March 2017 hit around three-quarters of the blueberry crop.
Recent poor weather in the Spanish region of Valencia has resulted in huge production losses in fruit crops across thousands of hectares, according to the Valencian Farmers Association. It said the total frost-damaged area could be around 7,500 hectares of farmland, while the economic losses will most likely be over €35 million.
The crops that have taken the most damage are stonefruit, but also affected are persimmons and the earlier varieties of citrus fruits and almonds.
In some areas, the entirety of the harvest has been affected, although the average amount is expected to fluctuate between 40%-70%.
AVA-ASAJA president Cristóbal Aguado said: “The cold arrived at a particularly delicate time because after a relatively warm and dry winter many fruits were already in an advanced state of production.”
“For many farmers, the season had already begun and this will have very negative repercussions for their work and towns which rely upon agriculture as their primary source of income,” he said.
In la Vall d’Albaida, people spoke of a “black frost”, characterized due to the dryness of the cold and low humidity, which is very harmful to agriculture. AVA-ASAJA said it stops the formation of a layer of ice on the fruit, and instead the cold falls directly upon the molecular structure, destroying the internal tissue and eventually causing the fruit to die.
In la Ribera Alta, the frosts hit at the end of February, affecting around 500 hectares and worsening the region’s stonefruit production levels.
AVA-ASAJA also estimated the persimmon harvest could be 10% less than last year.
It added La Costera is facing problems with persimmons, citrus fruits and almond trees, while other areas, such as Utiel-Requena predict their almond trees are going to suffer a sharp decrease in flowers due to the cold.
The weather in North America, especially throughout the Corn Belt has been unfavorable - including parts of Nebraska, Iowa and Illinois.
In Minnesota, bumper crops and slightly better prices for some commodities just wasn't enough to save most farmers there from a fifth straight year of thin profits while producers of non-insurable crops fear that low yields and loss of inventory could extend into the 2020s.
As of March 2018, it is said that times are tough in America's heartland as farmers struggle with low crop prices for another year. Farmers are seeing incomes decline, forcing them to cut expenses. Some are even looking for second jobs or to exit agriculture altogether.
The U.S. government is forecasting 2017 will be recorded as the fifth-consecutive year of lower corn sales as some growers worry 2018 may bring another year of limited profitability to losses.
Overall, crop cash receipts — the income from crop sales during 2017 — are forecast to be $189.9 billion, that's down 2 percent from last year.
That would represent the fifth-consecutive year of lower corn receipts, and the total dollar value of the crop is expected to be the lowest number recorded since 2009.
Midwestern corn farmers have been experiencing below break-evens and it is not just a matter of grain prices as it is input costs of seed, chemical and fertilizer prices that are not coming down as quickly as grain prices have dived.
Corn represents about 13 percent of total agricultural commodity receipts in the U.S. and ranks second only behind cattle. It is also the main U.S. grain feed as almost 40 percent of the crop is used for ethanol.
What is happening is that many farming operations are having trouble adjusting to the fact that they had a tremendous commodity runup from 2007 to 2013 where there were major margins in corn and soybean production.
The cost structures shifted along with that runup and so farmers are now trying to catch up with lower crop prices.
For corn, average monthly prices have trended below $3.50 per bushel this year and remains below $4 since late mid-2014 which is well below the $7 per bushel price corn averaged during 2012-2013.
As a result of low crop prices and depressed farm incomes being reports are coming in that farm machinery dealerships are not selling equipment, car dealerships are having tougher times and furniture stores are feeling the impact.
Third-generation farmers are talking about searching for second jobs to help offset losses so they can pay grocery and utility bills. And, some growers are thinking about to leaving farming entirely.
There are those who push the ideology of 'man-made global warming' who contend that regenerating soil by turning our backs on industrial farming holds the key to tackling climate change. This is total lunacy.
Farmers worldwide are nearing the Sun's Grand Minimum, which marks the exacerbation of the weather of global cooling that will persist throughout the decades of the 2020s, 2030s and 2040s. Preparation means just that and forecasts for each region will make the difference between success and failure of crops.
Another amazing fact that is coming out of the research on the Sun deals with cosmic rays as these powerful energetic atomic particles travel at nearly the speed of light to penetrate the Earth's atmosphere and surface.
During solar maximum, the Sun produces a large plasma bubble around the entire solar system. Called the heliosphere, it is a giant shield that deflects these harmful particles away from Earth.
During solar minimum, the heliosphere is weakened and more of these particles can affect us here on Earth. Some scientists have also theorized that the silica magma inside the Earth is excited by the increase in cosmic rays, possibly increasing the number of earthquakes and volcanic activity. High altitude instrumentation balloon measurements show an increase in cosmic rays since 2015.
Some serious research seems to indicate that this is true. Additional volcanic dust and aerosols in the atmosphere also add to changes in the temperatures on Earth.
Galactic cosmic rays come from outside our solar system. A mixture of high-energy photons and sub-atomic particles accelerated toward Earth by supernova explosions and other violent events in the cosmos.
The first line of defense is the Sun as its magnetic field and solar wind combine in the heliosphere which shields against cosmic rays trying to enter the solar system.
The heliosphere of the Sun is strongest during its solar maximum but is at its weakest during solar minimum, which is nearing.
Cosmic ray penetration is getting worse according to a new paper recently published in the research journal 'Space Weather.'
The authors, led by Professor Nathan Schwadron of the University of New Hampshire, says cosmic radiation from deep space is dangerous and intensifying faster than previously thought.
The abstract reads:
"Over the last decade, the solar wind has exhibited low densities and magnetic field strengths, representing anomalous states that have never been observed during the space age. As discussed by Schwadron et al. (2014a), the cycle 23–24 solar activity led to the longest solar minimum in more than 80 years and continued into the “mini” solar maximum of cycle 24.
During this weak activity, we observed galactic cosmic ray fluxes that exceeded the levels observed throughout the space age, and we observed small solar energetic particle events. Here, we provide an update to the Schwadron et al (2014a) observations from the Cosmic Ray Telescope for the Effects of Radiation (CRaTER) on the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO).
The Schwadron et al. (2014a) study examined the evolution of the interplanetary magnetic field, and utilized a previously published study by Goelzer et al. (2013) projecting out the interplanetary magnetic field strength based on the evolution of sunspots as a proxy for the rate that the Sun releases coronal mass ejections (CMEs).
This led to a projection of dose rates from galactic cosmic rays on the lunar surface, which suggested a ∼20% increase of dose rates from one solar minimum to the next, and indicated that the radiation environment in space may be a worsening factor important for consideration in future planning of human space exploration.
We compare the predictions of Schwadron et al. (2014a) with the actual dose rates observed by CRaTER in the last 4 years. The observed dose rates exceed the predictions by ∼10%, showing that the radiation environment is worsening more rapidly than previously estimated.
Much of this increase is attributable to relatively low‐energy ions, which can be effectively shielded. Despite the continued paucity of solar activity, one of the hardest solar events in almost a decade occurred in Sept 2017 after more than a year of all‐clear periods."
So, it is not a wonder why very serious questions are being asked about the truth of the ideology of 'man-made global warming' in light of the thousands of weather records broken over the course of the northern hemispheric winter of 2017-2018 under the new official climate of global cooling.
American Thinker magazine reported in March 2018 that,
"The east coast of the United States just endured a rare spring snowstorm. How could this happen when NASA is constantly announcing that we have record high temperatures?
Advocates of the global warming theory have been predicting rising temperatures since around 1983. Available data indicated no such trend, so these advocates found reasons to adjust past temperatures downward. People who remembered the 1930s as being the hottest decade of their lifetimes were ignored. If people witness spring snowstorms, should they be ignored, too?
Recent scientific work predicts that the Sun's output will diminish in our lifetimes. Valentina Zharkova estimates that we will have an ice age from about 2020 to 2053.
The theory about ice ages is simple. Do you remember when your science teacher would rap two tuning forks against a table? They would make two tones plus a periodic lull, which your teacher called a beat.
Zharkova believes that the Sun has two resonances and that they sometimes cause a beat. The last beat observed, the Maunder Minimum, was from 1645 to 1715. It accompanied a climatic episode known as the 'Little Ice Age.'
How did Zharkova investigate this theory? She derived an equation to describe the theory. She then fitted the constants with sunspot data over a recent 33-year period. She then extrapolated back 3,000 years and compared the Sun's activity to Earth temperatures and found that they correlate. She then extrapolated forward and predicted an upcoming mini-ice age.
The ideology of 'man-made global warming' and all the theories which have been proven outright fiction time and time again has led to the world being unprepared for the climate change to global cooling.
Global cooling began officially in mid-December 2017, just in time for the northern hemispheric winter which has broken thousands of weather and temperature records across the hemisphere.
This climate change was not predicted by climatologists whom for decades have pushed the ideology of 'man-made global warming' which does not exist. The Earth is not "rapidly warming' as alarmists continue to say.
The Earth's atmosphere now has about 338 parts per million of CO2. For decades, CO2 has been called a 'pollutant' by ideologues, the mainstream media, politicians and so-called 'scientists.'
But, to say that CO2 a pollutant, is a straight out lie.
Humans exhale 40,000 parts per million of CO2 in our breath; and CO2 is vital to the growth of plants that take in CO2 and release oxygen.
I challenge anyone to name any instance where CO2 is a pollutant. People who call CO2 a pollutant are ignorant and have agendas that has nothing whatsoever to do with 'climate change.'
Emissions of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere does not cause 'climate change,' nor 'global warming and it is impossible for the Earth to become a classic greenhouse because of it.
That very notion violates all the laws of astrophysics and thermodynamics.
Every single climate computer model has failed proving that any emissions of CO2 'changes the Earth's climate.'
And I remind all that the greatest greenhouse gas the world over is not CO2 - but is WATER VAPOR.
The Earth is seven-tenths water.
We live on a water planet, which seems to have been forgotten by the majority of climate scientists who claim that human beings cause 'climate change,' - that is, 'man-made global warming.'
Yet, governments, populations and institutions have been conned into believing that humanity is the cause of 'global warming' and 'climate change' despite the fact that it is the Sun that governs Earth's entire climate.
In my long-held climate forecast for the arrival of global cooling, it continues to be my prediction that as the Sun’s magnetism diminishes with less ultraviolet radiation reaching Earth that we are entering a new ice age.
The decline of energy from the Sun to the Earth has already started.
The thinning of the Earth's ozone layer from reduced ultraviolet radiance and light has been altering the temperature ranges of the Earth's upper atmosphere.
The change has also altered the polar jet stream and wind patterns from zonal to meridional flows has led to frequencies of polar air intrusions from higher latitudes to mid-latitude regions.
How you, the reader, along with everyone else, will face and survive the decades just ahead will depend on your ability to reject rampant ideology, man-made global warming bullshit and to wake up to learning how to live as a responsible human being aware of how your own planet's climate and weather functions - here in the real world.
This recent winter season in the northern hemisphere has confirmed that we are in a new climate regime - that of global cooling - a climate will dominate weather in both hemispheres over the next three decades.
And to further prove my point with ever more confirmations of these facts, you can see how parts of continental Europe (already recovering from a recent brutal Siberian polar snap) is about to experience yet another round of arctic weather just before the vernal equinox of March 20th.
In contrast, the global warming advocates made a theory and tampered data to fit it. They extrapolated it forward, waited a few decades, then saw that it disagreed with data. They then made excuses. They are not acting as scientists."
Rather we should prepare for a repeat of the Little Ice Age but future generations will know if we made the right decision. It would be embarrassing if future historians say about us:
"Those twenty-first-century people prepared for global warming in the middle of an ice age. What a bunch of idiots."
Meanwhile, data available from the NASA, GISS websites have been routinely cited as indicative of global warming despite their known weaknesses.
The three years 2015 through 2017 are widely reported as being the three hottest years on record despite proof to the contrary.
Tony Heller, however, has demonstrated that tampering with data from the U.S. Climatology Network (USHCN) has created the illusion of much higher temperatures in reported data than in the original data for the continental United States. This leads one to wonder how much not so widely known 'adjustments' in GISS data have been responsible for similar results at a global level.
The GISS data are updated around the middle of each month, and I have compared the January and March versions in figure 1, for the years 1881 through 2017. The data are smoothed over two years, in that, for example, the 1881 data point is the average of 1880 and 1881 and 2017 the average for 2016 and 2017.
This is commonly done to make data more presentable, allowing movements to be more clearly discerned and to smooth out the effects of "abnormal" years.
This comparison allows two interesting observations. Firstly, the March revised data indicate somewhat higher temperatures in roughly the early third of the period, and somewhat lower temperatures the last third of the period.
The overall pattern, one of warming, however, remains, albeit slightly more muted than in the January version of the data, with 2015 through 2017 still being indicated as record hot years.
Importantly, the data points for 2016 and 2017 are much lower in the revised data, and the three years 2015 to 2017 show no acceleration in temperatures.
The second observation is that the 2017 data point (an average of 2016 and 2017 anomalies) is slightly lower than the 2016 point (an average of 2015 and 2016.)
This implies that temperatures have fallen substantially during some months in 2017 below those of 2016, as if some sort of cycle may be taking place.
One can observe this from the monthly data in Figure 2, where temperatures peak in the first three months of 2016 before declining sharply in April and falling below those of 2015 from October through December.
Temperatures for the first eleven months of 2017 are below those of the corresponding months in 2016.
Importantly, the downward trend in temperatures continues into 2018, where January and February anomalies are both below December 2017 and those of the previous three years.
The tampering of weather data to 'hide the decline' of warming and the rise of cooler weather events is a crime and it calls into question the motivation of those who propagate 'man-made global warming' for personal career advancement at the expense of the truth of global cooling and the very serious consequences for the entire planet.
Agriculture and farmers must prepare quickly now due to the fact that so much past preparation time has been wasted by the ideology of 'man-made global warming.'
Farming is a stressful occupation and it is a fact that farmers have higher suicide rates than almost any other occupation.
Those working in farming, fishing and forestry were reportedly 3.4 times more likely than other American worker to commit suicide on the job, according to a 2016 study by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
For instance, with milk prices depressed, dairy farmers looking to sell are having a difficult time finding buyers according to the New York Times, which reports that n New York State, many smaller farms, facing financial hardship or run by aging owners, are closing at a rate of over 100 per year. Many of them become part of much larger operations.
New York is the third largest milk-producing state in the country but low milk prices have not only devastated farmers financially — as most dairy farmers are selling milk for less than it costs to produce.
About 550 dairy farms closed in the state from 2012 to 2017, as the number of dairy cows increased to 625,000, up from 610,000, in that same period, and milk production has risen steadily in recent years, according to the state’s Department of Agriculture and Markets.
These issues will become exacerbated by the weather of global cooling as pressure mounts to make major improvements on farming infrastructure while holding out until prices rise from their multi-year lows.
My warning is the same as it has always been. Heed long-range forecasts because doing so saves much later heartache and losses as is being experienced currently. However, this is nothing compared to what is ahead for the 2020s and those in agriculture need to get all their ducks in a row to prepare for the climate of global cooling.
~ Theodore White, astromet.sci
Agriculture Must Prepare
by Theodore White, astromet.sci
Ice covers the pier of a harbor at Constance, Lake Constance, Germany on March 1, 2018
The era of global cooling began mid-December 2017, as I have long forecasted and the winter season throughout the northern hemisphere has seen the weather of this new climate regime take hold - stretching from North America to Eurasia.
Throughout most of North America, a polar outbreak saw frigid temperatures from late December 2017 into early January to the Midwest, East and South.
Numerous American cities in the East saw the coldest first week of January on record. The arctic blast experienced in the eastern U.S. resulted in the coldest first week of January on record - and this took place just as my long-stated forecast for the official arrival of global cooling to come by mid-December 2017.
Meanwhile, in Europe, heavy snowfall, followed by arctic temperatures struck popular tourist destinations in Italy, forcing the closure of the dome on Florence's cathedral and Giotto's bell tower.
Snow was to be seen on beaches, even in the south of the country. Snow fell in Rome, Venice, Siena, Pisa, Florence and Naples.
In southern France, at least 1,500 stranded motorists were evacuated from their cars on motorways near Montpellier.
The Norwegian municipality Folldal in the southeastern county of Hedmark recorded Europe's lowest temperature as mercury plunged to minus 41.8 degrees Celsius, public broadcaster NRK reported, citing the Norwegian Meteorological Institute.
I have long forecasted that by December 2017 the world would see the start of the new climate era of global cooling, a mini ice age, which will rival the previous Maunder Minimum.
Despite calls that I was wrong and that humanity is the cause of global warming, with ever rising temperatures, I continued to forecast and predict that global cooling would begin officially in mid-December 2017, just ahead of the Sun's Grand Minimum.
The cause of climate changes is the Sun, which governs the Earth's climate and its weather. Modulated by the planets of our solar system, all climate change comes from astrophysical causes and the effects are geophysical, resulting in various forms of 'weather' here, on Earth.
In reality, there is no such thing as 'man-made global warming,' or 'man-made climate change.' That is impossible according to the laws of physics and thermodynamics.
The Sun is the source of light, heat and the entire well-being of our planet. Taking a closer look at the Sun and how the solar sunspot cycle affects the Earth is rich in history and holds the key to understanding how the Earth's highly variable climate and weather actually functions - in the real world.
We have been taught that the basic sunspot cycle is a period of eleven (11) years from peak to peak. We also learned that during this cycle the Earth is affected in many ways, most importantly, how the Earth's climate reacts to the changes of activity of the Sun.
During the peak of a solar cycle, many sunspots appear on the surface or the photosphere of the Sun, along with numerous solar flares and larger events known as CMEs, that is, coronal mass ejections. These events stream out high energy particles at the Earth and disrupt radio, computer electronics, satellite and space travel operations.
New research is telling us that the next solar minimum - starting with the soon-to-be Solar Cycle #25 - may be the deepest minimum in more than 100 years.
If that is true, data showed that during solar minimum with less sunspots, solar surface flares and CMEs, there is a strong potential for a large scale cooling of the weather on Earth - a mini ice age.
This goes against those who say that a steady increase in worldwide temperatures is caused by human beings.
New research claims that a spotless Sun during previous sunspot minimas have led to sustained periods of cold weather and crop failures around the planet.
The most pronounced was the great Maunder Minimum from 1640 to 1715, in which the Earth experienced major climatic change.
There have been other deep solar minima, but not on the same scale as the Grand Minimum.
In the most simplistic way, the research tells us that the less sunspot numbers on the Sun, the cooler the planet becomes. The higher the sunspot numbers, the warmer the planet gets.
More cooling and there exists a greater percentage of crop failures, as well as, higher fuel prices and food prices. That would not be good for the global economy, as we may approach this small mini ice age.
For over a decade, I have been warning agriculture in general and farmers in particular to prepare for the era of global cooling.
Despite many farmers enjoying record crop yields and very good price levels before 2015; it has been a fact that agriculture simply wanted to sit back and enjoy their earnings but did not want to save, nor see either the commodities price bust of late 2014 coming; nor wanted to face the real threat of global cooling I have long been warning about.
Crop losses have come from the weather of global cooling, which features torrential rains and floods, excessive drought, radical temperature variations and the increase of cosmic rays causing low level clouds and reduced sunlight.
For instance, Peru has seen a lack of rain which threatens mango, banana and lemon crops. And 2018 marks the second consecutive year that Georgia peach and blueberry growers have been affected by frost damages with low temperatures in March 2017 hit around three-quarters of the blueberry crop.
Recent poor weather in the Spanish region of Valencia has resulted in huge production losses in fruit crops across thousands of hectares, according to the Valencian Farmers Association. It said the total frost-damaged area could be around 7,500 hectares of farmland, while the economic losses will most likely be over €35 million.
The crops that have taken the most damage are stonefruit, but also affected are persimmons and the earlier varieties of citrus fruits and almonds.
In some areas, the entirety of the harvest has been affected, although the average amount is expected to fluctuate between 40%-70%.
AVA-ASAJA president Cristóbal Aguado said: “The cold arrived at a particularly delicate time because after a relatively warm and dry winter many fruits were already in an advanced state of production.”
“For many farmers, the season had already begun and this will have very negative repercussions for their work and towns which rely upon agriculture as their primary source of income,” he said.
In la Vall d’Albaida, people spoke of a “black frost”, characterized due to the dryness of the cold and low humidity, which is very harmful to agriculture. AVA-ASAJA said it stops the formation of a layer of ice on the fruit, and instead the cold falls directly upon the molecular structure, destroying the internal tissue and eventually causing the fruit to die.
In la Ribera Alta, the frosts hit at the end of February, affecting around 500 hectares and worsening the region’s stonefruit production levels.
AVA-ASAJA also estimated the persimmon harvest could be 10% less than last year.
It added La Costera is facing problems with persimmons, citrus fruits and almond trees, while other areas, such as Utiel-Requena predict their almond trees are going to suffer a sharp decrease in flowers due to the cold.
The weather in North America, especially throughout the Corn Belt has been unfavorable - including parts of Nebraska, Iowa and Illinois.
In Minnesota, bumper crops and slightly better prices for some commodities just wasn't enough to save most farmers there from a fifth straight year of thin profits while producers of non-insurable crops fear that low yields and loss of inventory could extend into the 2020s.
As of March 2018, it is said that times are tough in America's heartland as farmers struggle with low crop prices for another year. Farmers are seeing incomes decline, forcing them to cut expenses. Some are even looking for second jobs or to exit agriculture altogether.
The U.S. government is forecasting 2017 will be recorded as the fifth-consecutive year of lower corn sales as some growers worry 2018 may bring another year of limited profitability to losses.
Overall, crop cash receipts — the income from crop sales during 2017 — are forecast to be $189.9 billion, that's down 2 percent from last year.
That would represent the fifth-consecutive year of lower corn receipts, and the total dollar value of the crop is expected to be the lowest number recorded since 2009.
Midwestern corn farmers have been experiencing below break-evens and it is not just a matter of grain prices as it is input costs of seed, chemical and fertilizer prices that are not coming down as quickly as grain prices have dived.
Corn represents about 13 percent of total agricultural commodity receipts in the U.S. and ranks second only behind cattle. It is also the main U.S. grain feed as almost 40 percent of the crop is used for ethanol.
What is happening is that many farming operations are having trouble adjusting to the fact that they had a tremendous commodity runup from 2007 to 2013 where there were major margins in corn and soybean production.
The cost structures shifted along with that runup and so farmers are now trying to catch up with lower crop prices.
For corn, average monthly prices have trended below $3.50 per bushel this year and remains below $4 since late mid-2014 which is well below the $7 per bushel price corn averaged during 2012-2013.
As a result of low crop prices and depressed farm incomes being reports are coming in that farm machinery dealerships are not selling equipment, car dealerships are having tougher times and furniture stores are feeling the impact.
Third-generation farmers are talking about searching for second jobs to help offset losses so they can pay grocery and utility bills. And, some growers are thinking about to leaving farming entirely.
There are those who push the ideology of 'man-made global warming' who contend that regenerating soil by turning our backs on industrial farming holds the key to tackling climate change. This is total lunacy.
Farmers worldwide are nearing the Sun's Grand Minimum, which marks the exacerbation of the weather of global cooling that will persist throughout the decades of the 2020s, 2030s and 2040s. Preparation means just that and forecasts for each region will make the difference between success and failure of crops.
Another amazing fact that is coming out of the research on the Sun deals with cosmic rays as these powerful energetic atomic particles travel at nearly the speed of light to penetrate the Earth's atmosphere and surface.
During solar maximum, the Sun produces a large plasma bubble around the entire solar system. Called the heliosphere, it is a giant shield that deflects these harmful particles away from Earth.
During solar minimum, the heliosphere is weakened and more of these particles can affect us here on Earth. Some scientists have also theorized that the silica magma inside the Earth is excited by the increase in cosmic rays, possibly increasing the number of earthquakes and volcanic activity. High altitude instrumentation balloon measurements show an increase in cosmic rays since 2015.
Some serious research seems to indicate that this is true. Additional volcanic dust and aerosols in the atmosphere also add to changes in the temperatures on Earth.
Galactic cosmic rays come from outside our solar system. A mixture of high-energy photons and sub-atomic particles accelerated toward Earth by supernova explosions and other violent events in the cosmos.
The first line of defense is the Sun as its magnetic field and solar wind combine in the heliosphere which shields against cosmic rays trying to enter the solar system.
The heliosphere of the Sun is strongest during its solar maximum but is at its weakest during solar minimum, which is nearing.
Cosmic ray penetration is getting worse according to a new paper recently published in the research journal 'Space Weather.'
The authors, led by Professor Nathan Schwadron of the University of New Hampshire, says cosmic radiation from deep space is dangerous and intensifying faster than previously thought.
The abstract reads:
"Over the last decade, the solar wind has exhibited low densities and magnetic field strengths, representing anomalous states that have never been observed during the space age. As discussed by Schwadron et al. (2014a), the cycle 23–24 solar activity led to the longest solar minimum in more than 80 years and continued into the “mini” solar maximum of cycle 24.
During this weak activity, we observed galactic cosmic ray fluxes that exceeded the levels observed throughout the space age, and we observed small solar energetic particle events. Here, we provide an update to the Schwadron et al (2014a) observations from the Cosmic Ray Telescope for the Effects of Radiation (CRaTER) on the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO).
The Schwadron et al. (2014a) study examined the evolution of the interplanetary magnetic field, and utilized a previously published study by Goelzer et al. (2013) projecting out the interplanetary magnetic field strength based on the evolution of sunspots as a proxy for the rate that the Sun releases coronal mass ejections (CMEs).
This led to a projection of dose rates from galactic cosmic rays on the lunar surface, which suggested a ∼20% increase of dose rates from one solar minimum to the next, and indicated that the radiation environment in space may be a worsening factor important for consideration in future planning of human space exploration.
We compare the predictions of Schwadron et al. (2014a) with the actual dose rates observed by CRaTER in the last 4 years. The observed dose rates exceed the predictions by ∼10%, showing that the radiation environment is worsening more rapidly than previously estimated.
Much of this increase is attributable to relatively low‐energy ions, which can be effectively shielded. Despite the continued paucity of solar activity, one of the hardest solar events in almost a decade occurred in Sept 2017 after more than a year of all‐clear periods."
So, it is not a wonder why very serious questions are being asked about the truth of the ideology of 'man-made global warming' in light of the thousands of weather records broken over the course of the northern hemispheric winter of 2017-2018 under the new official climate of global cooling.
American Thinker magazine reported in March 2018 that,
"The east coast of the United States just endured a rare spring snowstorm. How could this happen when NASA is constantly announcing that we have record high temperatures?
Advocates of the global warming theory have been predicting rising temperatures since around 1983. Available data indicated no such trend, so these advocates found reasons to adjust past temperatures downward. People who remembered the 1930s as being the hottest decade of their lifetimes were ignored. If people witness spring snowstorms, should they be ignored, too?
Recent scientific work predicts that the Sun's output will diminish in our lifetimes. Valentina Zharkova estimates that we will have an ice age from about 2020 to 2053.
The theory about ice ages is simple. Do you remember when your science teacher would rap two tuning forks against a table? They would make two tones plus a periodic lull, which your teacher called a beat.
Zharkova believes that the Sun has two resonances and that they sometimes cause a beat. The last beat observed, the Maunder Minimum, was from 1645 to 1715. It accompanied a climatic episode known as the 'Little Ice Age.'
How did Zharkova investigate this theory? She derived an equation to describe the theory. She then fitted the constants with sunspot data over a recent 33-year period. She then extrapolated back 3,000 years and compared the Sun's activity to Earth temperatures and found that they correlate. She then extrapolated forward and predicted an upcoming mini-ice age.
The ideology of 'man-made global warming' and all the theories which have been proven outright fiction time and time again has led to the world being unprepared for the climate change to global cooling.
Global cooling began officially in mid-December 2017, just in time for the northern hemispheric winter which has broken thousands of weather and temperature records across the hemisphere.
This climate change was not predicted by climatologists whom for decades have pushed the ideology of 'man-made global warming' which does not exist. The Earth is not "rapidly warming' as alarmists continue to say.
The Earth's atmosphere now has about 338 parts per million of CO2. For decades, CO2 has been called a 'pollutant' by ideologues, the mainstream media, politicians and so-called 'scientists.'
But, to say that CO2 a pollutant, is a straight out lie.
Humans exhale 40,000 parts per million of CO2 in our breath; and CO2 is vital to the growth of plants that take in CO2 and release oxygen.
I challenge anyone to name any instance where CO2 is a pollutant. People who call CO2 a pollutant are ignorant and have agendas that has nothing whatsoever to do with 'climate change.'
Emissions of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere does not cause 'climate change,' nor 'global warming and it is impossible for the Earth to become a classic greenhouse because of it.
That very notion violates all the laws of astrophysics and thermodynamics.
Every single climate computer model has failed proving that any emissions of CO2 'changes the Earth's climate.'
And I remind all that the greatest greenhouse gas the world over is not CO2 - but is WATER VAPOR.
The Earth is seven-tenths water.
We live on a water planet, which seems to have been forgotten by the majority of climate scientists who claim that human beings cause 'climate change,' - that is, 'man-made global warming.'
Yet, governments, populations and institutions have been conned into believing that humanity is the cause of 'global warming' and 'climate change' despite the fact that it is the Sun that governs Earth's entire climate.
In my long-held climate forecast for the arrival of global cooling, it continues to be my prediction that as the Sun’s magnetism diminishes with less ultraviolet radiation reaching Earth that we are entering a new ice age.
The decline of energy from the Sun to the Earth has already started.
The thinning of the Earth's ozone layer from reduced ultraviolet radiance and light has been altering the temperature ranges of the Earth's upper atmosphere.
The change has also altered the polar jet stream and wind patterns from zonal to meridional flows has led to frequencies of polar air intrusions from higher latitudes to mid-latitude regions.
How you, the reader, along with everyone else, will face and survive the decades just ahead will depend on your ability to reject rampant ideology, man-made global warming bullshit and to wake up to learning how to live as a responsible human being aware of how your own planet's climate and weather functions - here in the real world.
This recent winter season in the northern hemisphere has confirmed that we are in a new climate regime - that of global cooling - a climate will dominate weather in both hemispheres over the next three decades.
And to further prove my point with ever more confirmations of these facts, you can see how parts of continental Europe (already recovering from a recent brutal Siberian polar snap) is about to experience yet another round of arctic weather just before the vernal equinox of March 20th.
In contrast, the global warming advocates made a theory and tampered data to fit it. They extrapolated it forward, waited a few decades, then saw that it disagreed with data. They then made excuses. They are not acting as scientists."
Rather we should prepare for a repeat of the Little Ice Age but future generations will know if we made the right decision. It would be embarrassing if future historians say about us:
"Those twenty-first-century people prepared for global warming in the middle of an ice age. What a bunch of idiots."
Meanwhile, data available from the NASA, GISS websites have been routinely cited as indicative of global warming despite their known weaknesses.
The three years 2015 through 2017 are widely reported as being the three hottest years on record despite proof to the contrary.
Tony Heller, however, has demonstrated that tampering with data from the U.S. Climatology Network (USHCN) has created the illusion of much higher temperatures in reported data than in the original data for the continental United States. This leads one to wonder how much not so widely known 'adjustments' in GISS data have been responsible for similar results at a global level.
The GISS data are updated around the middle of each month, and I have compared the January and March versions in figure 1, for the years 1881 through 2017. The data are smoothed over two years, in that, for example, the 1881 data point is the average of 1880 and 1881 and 2017 the average for 2016 and 2017.
This is commonly done to make data more presentable, allowing movements to be more clearly discerned and to smooth out the effects of "abnormal" years.
This comparison allows two interesting observations. Firstly, the March revised data indicate somewhat higher temperatures in roughly the early third of the period, and somewhat lower temperatures the last third of the period.
The overall pattern, one of warming, however, remains, albeit slightly more muted than in the January version of the data, with 2015 through 2017 still being indicated as record hot years.
Importantly, the data points for 2016 and 2017 are much lower in the revised data, and the three years 2015 to 2017 show no acceleration in temperatures.
The second observation is that the 2017 data point (an average of 2016 and 2017 anomalies) is slightly lower than the 2016 point (an average of 2015 and 2016.)
This implies that temperatures have fallen substantially during some months in 2017 below those of 2016, as if some sort of cycle may be taking place.
One can observe this from the monthly data in Figure 2, where temperatures peak in the first three months of 2016 before declining sharply in April and falling below those of 2015 from October through December.
Temperatures for the first eleven months of 2017 are below those of the corresponding months in 2016.
Importantly, the downward trend in temperatures continues into 2018, where January and February anomalies are both below December 2017 and those of the previous three years.
The tampering of weather data to 'hide the decline' of warming and the rise of cooler weather events is a crime and it calls into question the motivation of those who propagate 'man-made global warming' for personal career advancement at the expense of the truth of global cooling and the very serious consequences for the entire planet.
Agriculture and farmers must prepare quickly now due to the fact that so much past preparation time has been wasted by the ideology of 'man-made global warming.'
Farming is a stressful occupation and it is a fact that farmers have higher suicide rates than almost any other occupation.
Those working in farming, fishing and forestry were reportedly 3.4 times more likely than other American worker to commit suicide on the job, according to a 2016 study by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
For instance, with milk prices depressed, dairy farmers looking to sell are having a difficult time finding buyers according to the New York Times, which reports that n New York State, many smaller farms, facing financial hardship or run by aging owners, are closing at a rate of over 100 per year. Many of them become part of much larger operations.
New York is the third largest milk-producing state in the country but low milk prices have not only devastated farmers financially — as most dairy farmers are selling milk for less than it costs to produce.
About 550 dairy farms closed in the state from 2012 to 2017, as the number of dairy cows increased to 625,000, up from 610,000, in that same period, and milk production has risen steadily in recent years, according to the state’s Department of Agriculture and Markets.
These issues will become exacerbated by the weather of global cooling as pressure mounts to make major improvements on farming infrastructure while holding out until prices rise from their multi-year lows.
My warning is the same as it has always been. Heed long-range forecasts because doing so saves much later heartache and losses as is being experienced currently. However, this is nothing compared to what is ahead for the 2020s and those in agriculture need to get all their ducks in a row to prepare for the climate of global cooling.
~ Theodore White, astromet.sci